capacity of the relevant government agency responsible over delivering vaccination. Control of
other serious diseases, such as poliomyelitis, chicken pox, and HIV-AIDS, pose more difficult
challenges. Interviewees in district and provincial level observed that the district/city
government does not have sufficient technical and financial support to deal with such diseases.
Therefore, interviewees recommended that the responsibility to control certain endemic diseases
should be transferred back to the provincial and central government, in accordance with their
respective capacities. They recommend that assignment of functions to the regional government
should observe the capacity of the regional government to implement the function.
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Absence of mechanism to withdraw and add government functions

Another issue related to functional assignment is the absence of a mechanism to withdraw and
add functions. The dynamics of regional governance is a reminder for the central government
regarding the importance of creating regulations to withdraw and add functions for regional
governments. Law No. 5 Year 1974 allows for a mechanism to adjust functions assigned to
different government levels. According to this law, the government may add functions to
regional governments through a government regulation, and withdraw a given function through
issuing a regulation of the same level. Further, in adding and withdrawing functions to and from
the region, the President is advised by the Regional Autonomy Advisory Board (DPOD). The
need for a new mechanism to perform such degree of flexibility in the era of decentralization
ought to be concretely responded by the central government. The revision to Law No. 32 Year
2004 needs to consider this, as both the existing and draft revision to the law has not
accommodated this yet.
Interviewees in the three selected regions expressed the need for such regulation. In the
education sector, they proposed that the provincial government be given the authority to be
involved in the management of higher education (university), a domain that has been the sole
authority of the central government. Interviewees encouraged for an increase in the budget for
higher education and feel that they have the capacity to manage higher education. For the time
being, the West Java provincial government has given grants to universities in West Java for
research & development, scholarships for various subjects, as well as various other financial
supports. In order to be more involved in the management and maintenance of universities in
their region, they propose that the central government add higher education management as a
function for the provincial government. Nonetheless, as the mechanism to propose such change
has not yet been made, they do not know what avenue to take to pursue the issue.
The West Java provincial government also aspires to take over the management of high-schools
category RSBI/SBI (international standard) that are currently under the authority of the
district/city government. According to Law No. 38 Year 2007, international standard high
schools are managed by the provincial government. However, in practice such schools are
managed by the district/city government. Schools with international standard have become icons
of the district/city, whose students are mainly the children of high-ranking government officials
with high social standing in the region. The struggle to assert control over SBI schools created a
tension between the education services at the provincial and district/city levels. The absence of a
mechanism to propose for functional assignment changes in such a situation prolongs the
tension, and does not push for a reasonable resolution.
Another example that displays the urgency to create a mechanism to propose for changes in the
assignment of functions was articulated by several stakeholders in East Nusa Tenggara. They
proposed to return several activities in education management to the central government, e.g.